Décontractée
1990
Louise Bourgeois
French-American, 1911-2010
Contemporary Art
Throughout her career, Louise Bourgeois created biomorphic abstractions. In her work, fragmented body parts become phantom representations of her memories and experiences, and she often employed roughly finished marble blocks with exquisitely carved figurative elements growing from the stone mass. The psychological and the art historical mix seamlessly in the artist’s carvings. Here, the hard work of chiseling marble renders two recumbent hands, loosely relaxed on a monumental pedestal seemingly constructed for some more heroic purpose. Maintaining her own unheralded legacy for decades, and driven largely by an outcry by women supporters in the art world, Bourgeois had her first museum retrospective in 1982, after more than forty-five years as a practicing artist.
- Maker/Artist
- Bourgeois, Louise
- Classification
- Sculpture
- Formatted Medium
- Pink marble and steel base
- Dimensions
- 28 1/2 x 36 x 23 in. (72.4 x 91.4 x 58.4 cm) with steel supports: 1132 lb. (513.47kg)
- Departments
- Contemporary Art
- Accession Number
- 1994.124a-c
- Credit Line
- Purchased with funds given by Harry Kahn, Mrs. Carl L.Selden, the David H. Cogan Foundation, Inc., Contemporary Art Council, gift of Edward A. Bragaline, by exchange, and Mary Smith Dorward Fund
- Exhibitions
- Louise Bourgeois: The Locus of Memory, Works 1982-1993, American Identities: A New Look, Realm of Marvels: Building Collections for the Future, Out of Place: A Feminist Look at the Collection
- Rights Statement
- © artist or artist's estate
- Museum Location
- This item is not on view
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